Crow eyed the arrow in his hand, its edge stained red with his own blood. It was strange for him to be able to look at such a thing without feeling nauseated of dizzy. Even though it was only a small amount of blood, it was the first step of progress he had ever made to overcome his fear. He had never bothered to do anything about it before, since he had avoided fighting so successfully. But now, things were different.

Over the course of the past two weeks, they had gotten into at least three or four battles, and it wasn’t over yet. He knew he still had a long way to go before he could handle the sight of a serious injury, but at least he had figured out a way to keep himself from panicking to the point of freezing up. That had to count for something.

He started at the sound of Penelope’s voice. Turning around, he saw that she had woken up and was coming over to see what had happened to him. He averted his gaze as she knelt beside him, setting the arrow down on the other side of his body to hide it from her view. “I’m fine,” he said, meaning it honestly for the first time.

Glancing down at the cut on his arm, he toyed with the idea of telling her it had been an accident. He didn’t want to worry her by admitting he had done it intentionally. Even though he had cut himself to overcome his fear, he didn’t know if she would understand. She was so protective of him; she would probably tell him to stop out of concern for his wellbeing.

[i]I can’t lie to her though,[/i] Crow sighed. [i]I have to tell her the truth.[/i]

He turned to meet her gaze as she covered his cut with her hand. “Don’t freak out, but… I sort of did it to myself,” he shifted his weight uncomfortably. “I promise I’m not a masochist. I just… I’m tired of being a deadweight in battle. I can’t let my ridiculous fear keep me from fighting anymore.” He shrugged. “I know it probably wasn’t the smartest idea, but look,” pulling his arm out of her grasp, he wiped some of the blood away with his index finger and held it up. “See? I’m getting better.”

He brushed his hand off on his pant leg and then looked up again to hold her gaze once more, “I know you keep telling me not to worry because you can fight for both of us, but we don’t know what’s going to happen when we get to the castle. If we get separated or if you get injured or—” he couldn’t bring himself to finish saying ‘or die.’

He lowered his gaze before going on, “I want to be able to fight too. I’m going to keep learning what I can with the bow, but I can’t rely on a weapon I just picked up yesterday. If things go south, I need to do whatever I can to survive… and that means accepting the fact that I might have to fight someone up close.”